Setting yourself on fire

Dear friends at HoP, I have a question to the community that involves fire. A friend of mine and me are working on a concept for a new act and were playing with the thought of setting ourself (or at least one person) on fire as part of the act.

Now I know this question is going to get the replies stating it's not safe to try stuff like this and we should considder less extreme forms of fire entertainment. However, it's a one time show and we want to pull everything we got from the shelf.

So, the question:
What can we use for this purpose?

We've been lookong into firegel for the fireplace, but it boils at 82 plus degrees Celsius. Flash point is listed as 22. Does anyone here have expreience with this sort of stuff? And if so, are you willing to share the wisdom?

You know...that guy who did the fire slip and slide...

link here..warning Not Safe For Work

was planning on a one time show too.

I'd seriously reconsider this idea unless you're a graduate of stuntman school

seriously reconsider......

Ah yes, well...
Let me rephrase the plan:

1 arm/hand on fire is enough for us...
We don't want to burn down a neighborhood...
We don't want death and panic...
We want someone with an arm that catches fire...
We want to be able to put out the flames as soon an possible...

WE DO NOT WANT TO SET AN ENTIRE PERSON ON FIRE!

I hope that makes the idea clear to future repliers...
Sorry for my rant, I want people to understand the things we're planning an I do appreciate the link.

Rant appreciated, for all I know you could be just like that guy in the video.

The current theory we're working on is a leather glove from the tip of the finger to the shoulder. The plan is to cover the hand part of the glove fith fire paste (the type listed in the first post) up to the elbow. This will be set alight, therefore theoretically keeping a distance of aproximately 30 cm. between the flames and the end of the glove.

Can anyone give me pointers on why this theory would NOT work?
And secondly, pointers on how we CAN do this?

Well when working with fire there is dangerous, risky and then there is stupid. Any time you light up some poi or a staff its dangerous. Risky is Fire Breathing or some other act if something goes wrong there is a good chance of being hurt. There there is stupid. Lighting you arm on fire would be in the realm of stupid.

I have seen people do Fire Breathing off there hand and the safest way for doing a fire breath off a lit hand is were the lightly coat there hand in fuel. Then they hold a flint and some sand paper between there fingers and snap. The hand lights there do a small fire breath and then cover there hand in a damp towel. I wouldn't do it personally because I see that one close to the border between risky and stupid.

Hmmm i would recomend looking around for a stunt academy and doing a course there. I have seen somebody do a 3/4 body burn and it was a very complicated process which would need training.

Think about it this way, if you stuff up doing staff or poi most of the time you can just drop them and you will be fine, But if the fire is attached to you and something goes wrong then it would be very different.

Also chances are if you are not officially qualified to do body burns because and because there is a qualification that exists then your insurance will not cover you in the case of an accident.

Leather??? bad choice I would have thought

leather+fire=pain! trust me, i wear leather gloves in work and i'm a welder. They shrink when they get hot and they retain heat for a long time, so all the time spent trying to get them off because they've shrunk tight on your arm, they're still burning you! plus, leather stinks when it burns!

i also use kevlar sleeves, which are pretty much heatproof, but by fuelling them, you remove any heatproof properties they ever had, and you'll just end up burning yourself, badly!

the only 'safe' way to set anybody on fire, is to have them train to do it, and to wear a full burn suit, even if it's just a finger you want to set alight, better to be safe than sorry! if i were you, i'd leave this idea well alone. surely there's much more impressive things you can do than setting yourself on fire?

Errm - with fire it's not necessarily WYWIWYG (what-you-want-is-what-you-get) so I'd side Stout, saying two words: stuntman-school